Chapter 15

Diana

It happened so fast that the man didn’t even have time to scream. One second, he’s still here, and the next, a sickening crunch sounds in my ear and then he’s gone.

Warm blood splashes onto my face, flows down my cheeks and drips down my chin, but I’m too dazed to care. All I am able to do is lay there, eyes wide as I listen to the creature tearing into the man. The sounds; a cacophony of ripping flesh, crunching bones, and guttural growls, echo through the stillness of the wilderness like a macabre symphony of nature’s brutality.

“Ahhhhhh!” the short one screams, turns around and runs away. He trips, and falls, but scrambles back up and continues to run. In his fear, he doesn’t even realize that rather than running in the direction we came from, he’s heading deeper into the woods.

Of the two remaining men, one falls to the ground and a pungent smell starts to emit from him. He had pissed himself.

The next second, we hear a piercing scream of terror coming from the direction of the short man and then nothing. Silence.

The mind can already conjure up what had become of him.

The last one, who just like me, had been frozen in fear, unable to move, suddenly gives a violent shudder before grabbing his friend by the shoulder and hauling him up.

“L-l-let’s go…”

And on trembling legs, they disappear into the woods. This time, in the right direction.

I slowly pull myself up from the ground into a sitting position. I know I should probably run away as well, but for some reason, I am eerily calm. The logical part of my brain- if it had been working- would have told me to take my ass out of here before whatever killed those men came back and finished me too. But since it’s not, I continue to sit there.

Moments later, the sounds of crunching leaves reach my ears. I dazedly look over and that’s when I get my first real look at it.

At him.

It’s a wolf.

And he’s like nothing I have ever seen before. 

His black fur is so deep and velvety, that it seems to drink in the light around it, transforming shadows into shimmering pools of darkness. Each strand is like spun silk, imbued with an otherworldly sheen that dances with hidden hues of midnight and starlit silvers.

The red blood staining his snout and dripping down the sides of his mouth does nothing to diminish that beauty, instead, it adds more to his terrifying mystique.

His eyes are orbs of liquid sapphire; radiant, yet tinged with an unsettling intensity that emphasizes the untamed spirit within. There is a primal power there, a predator’s gaze that should terrify me, yet does nothing but draw me in.

He is absolutely magnificent and the most gorgeous creature I have ever laid eyes on. 

He is also big- goddess but he is absolutely massive.

My heart beats even faster against my ribs as he begins to approach me; my breath hitching in my throat.

His muscles ripple beneath his sleek coat as his sinuous body glides effortlessly through the shadows, every movement calculated and graceful, yet exuding an undeniable air of lethal power. With each step, he leaves behind a trail of both beauty and danger, embodying the perfect balance between elegance and lethality.

My hands curl into the moist sand as he comes to a stop in front of me. 

He lowers his large head until it is directly in front of me and then proceeds to sniff, his warm breath blowing my face. He then pushes his snout into the juncture between my neck and shoulder and sniffs again. His cold nose against my bare skin making me release an involuntary shiver.

He stills for a second and then chuffs. 

At this point, I can hear my heart loudly in my ears and I have long since stopped breathing. He nuzzles my neck once more and growls low in his throat- the sound vibrating from deep within his chest. 

And then he’s gone.

I sit there in a daze for a good few minutes before my senses come back to me.

The gravity of the danger that I was just in dawns on me and a sliver of fear snakes down my spine.

What the hell just happened?

Shuddering, I scramble to my feet and limp my way out of the forest. It takes me a little longer to find my way out as I had been running blindly when I came in. But thankfully, I hadn’t gone too far from the street.

By the time I make it back to my motel room, it’s almost midnight. I lock the door behind me and collapse on the floor. Everything that just happened comes back to me and I can’t help but shiver.

A part of me is still terrified by the encounter with those four men, but most of my brain is preoccupied with thoughts of that black wolf.

Who was that?… or rather, what was that?!

I remember seeing Alpha Magnus’ wolf once, and a pack member had bragged that he had one of the largest wolves ever seen in an Alpha. And with Alphas the general rule is that the larger the wolf, the more powerful the Alpha.

But this wolf…

This wolf makes Alpha Magnus’ wolf look like an adolescent cub.

Is it even possible for Weres to get that big?!

With that size, and that devastating speed, it still makes more sense for him to be a Were but at the same time…not.

And thinking back to those eerie yet captivating eyes… I have never seen or even heard of any werewolves having that eye colour before.

For Weres, regardless of the colour of their eyes in human form, the wolf form’s eye colour varies in shades of orange, amber and sometimes green, with the most common colour being yellow; just like common wild wolves. In fact, apart from their larger size, werewolves generally look like normal wild wolves.

Blue eyes on a Were is unheard of.

But most importantly, and for some reason- the thought shoots a painful pang in my heart- there had been no humanity in those eyes.

It was like gazing into the eyes of a wild wolf, devoid of any warmth… devoid of any humanity.